"At first we kept saying: ‘We’re going to beat it....

"At first we kept saying: ‘We’re going to beat it. We’re going to beat it.’ Then after awhile we began to realize that we might not beat it. Then toward the end, it became clear that we definitely weren’t going to beat it. That’s when she started telling me that she wanted me to move on and find happiness with somebody else. But I’m not quite there yet. Not long ago a noise woke me up in the middle of the night, and I rolled over to ask if she needed anything."